UNM LOBOS SOFTBALL
Lobo softball ends 20-year postseason drought
UNM clinches Mountain West tournament spot with home win over Utah State behind early offensive surge
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It had been 20 years.
Thursday night, the Lobo softball team wasn't interested in prolonging this drama any longer.
With four runs in the first inning, four more in the second and an 11-hit, three-home run offensive barrage, the UNM Lobos beat visiting Utah State 12-6 on Thursday night at the UNM Softball Field, clinching at least a top-6 finish in Mountain West play and a spot in next week's conference tournament.
The program has not played in the postseason the 2006 Mountain West Softball Tournament.
While the league tournament was discontinued for many of those 20 years, sending to the NCAA Tournament just its regular season champion most seasons, two decades is still two decades, and the Lobos (24-25, 11-12 Mountain West) are back.
While UNM has two more games in this regular season series finale 鈥� Friday at 2 p.m. and Saturday at noon 鈥� they could lose both and still hold any and all tiebrekers needed to remain one of the top six seeds for the double-elimination tournament.
Left fielder DeNae Vasquez-Dickson went 3-for-5 with a home run, a double and three runs scored; catcher Jessica Deleon was 2-for-3 with a homer and three RBIs; and right fielder Allie Williams was 2-for-2 with two walks, three runs scored an a no-doubt bomb a good 20 feet beyond the center field wall in the second inning.
Reach Geoff Grammer at ggrammer@abqjournal.com or follow him on Twitter (X) .
